Sleuthing was a total bust. While she was able to figure out a few things, none of it was particularly useful information, so Summer had no choice but to give up. The next morning, Summer’s mother immediately recognized the otter in her arms. Summer hadn’t even realized she had brought the plush to breakfast.

“Did you have fun on your aquarium date?” her mother asked, reaching over to pat the otter’s head.

Summer instinctively hugged the plush closer. “Yes,” she replied, embarrassed by what she was certain her mother was thinking. It hadn’t been anything more than an excuse and a distraction, but it had been fun, and more importantly she was no longer suspicious of Ashton. He was just as much a victim of this as everyone else.

“I’m glad,” she said, pleased when she saw her daughter’s bashful smile, “To be honest, I was a bit worried about you. You never took interest in relationships. You have no friends, and no aspirations other than your hero fixation. I thought once it was over you would fall apart.”

“Mooom,” Summer complained, somewhere between groan and whine.

Her mother shook her head lightly, still smiling. “Ashton seems like such a good boy. At first, I was worried you were trying to use him. Now I can finally put that idea completely to rest.”

Summer’s gaze snapped up in confusion. Finally put it to rest? “I thought you forgot about that after you met him.”

“Not entirely,” she said, “Something was a bit off. You two were a bit too… awkward. But some couples are like that.”

“So what convinced you?” Summer asked.

Her mother chuckled. “You haven’t noticed yet?”

Noticed what? What was she talking about? Summer was starting to feel incredibly self conscious as her mother’s gaze grew increasingly warm.

“Did you know? Right now you look like a girl in love.”

Summer nearly dropped her otter in shock. Impossible! She had definitely told Ashton she was alright with dating for real, but so soon? She just liked hanging out with him. Besides, she barely knew anything about him other than where he worked. Then again, she remembered the emotional roller coaster she went through while texting Ashton the previous day. Was that what it felt like to be in love? No, she felt that way every time she cared about someone else’s opinion on her thoughts. Love and romance were so much more… something. Summer wasn’t exactly sure what.

Her father came into the room shortly after. It was his day off so he wasn’t in any hurry to eat or leave. “Have you heard the news?” he broached as he sat at the table, “SI is being put through the wringer after this fake death scam of theirs. Of course, they are pinning everything on that villain who pulled the stunt.”

“Connin Collin,” her mother replied, nodding, “Can you really blame them? The kid had a record and only worked with them for a short time as some kind of community service.”

Stolen novel; please report.

This was the first Summer had heard of this part of the story. Then again, she had spent all of her time digging deep into the villain/hero conspiracy side of things.

“I’m glad you got out before this happened,” her father said, shaking his head, “What you had to go through was bad enough.”

“Yeah,” Summer agreed. For once, she was also completely glad she was no longer a hero. She would never be able to face Shadow Phoenix the way she had before. She didn’t want to imagine what it would be like for the other heroes.

“It hasn’t become a court case yet, but something is bound to happen,” her father continued, “I never thought I would see SI fall in this lifetime.”

The idea wawa chilling. SI had been around so long it was synonymous with heroes. With powers, even. Without it, what would they even do?

“I’m worried about Ashton,” Summer admitted.

Her father gave her a comforting smile. “If he finds himself out of work, he is always welcome in my company,” he promised, “He seems like a bright young man with plenty of potential.”

“For that matter,” her mother suddenly interjected, “Perhaps you should consider joining the company. If you want to marry that nice young man you will have to earn money for the wedding.”

“Mom,” Summer complained, feeling her face grow warmer and warmer. Why did she have to bring up marriage all of the sudden?

“That’s a long way off, of course,” her father added. It sounded a bit like a threat, but Summer had no desire to get married soon either. Things were a bit too complicated for that.

“I’ll think about it,” Summer said, “I just… After everything that happened I need some time.”

Luckily they let the subject drop after that and discussed lighter topics. Her mother did throw some surprise embarrassment her way by mentioning her cute future husband, or her lovestruck appearance this morning. They were right, though. Summer wanted to be more like Ashton. He was calm, independent, and dependable. If she got a job and lived on her own, could she be more like that?

To distract herself, Summer went back to her room to do more research. As soon as she opened the first social media site she noticed a PM. One from MysteriousMaskz himself. All thoughts of the morning conversation flew from her mind as she opened the message. Was he onto her?

“Fess up. You’ve been looking into me. What are you after?”

It was a bold and very direct message, but none of MysteriousMaskz’s previous posts had been very passive either. The problem was, how should she respond? Why was she looking for him, anyway? Revenge? No. She wanted answers. What kind of answers did she want most?

“I want to know what you know. You knew about this before everything happened,” Summer typed in reply.

That should be good enough for now. Summer hit send, and habitually scrolled to MysteriousMaskz latest post. This one was about the unjustified humiliation RefRain was receiving with his new nickname, Connin’ Collin. As she finished reading the post, she saw a new PM pop up. Already?

“What kinds of things do you want to know?”

This wasn’t going to go anywhere if she kept being vague, so she got straight to the point. “I want to find Shadow Phoenix and meet him face to face.”

Summer quickly backed out of the website as her nerves built up. It felt wrong to be poking at his secret identity now that he might not be a villain at all, but she needed to see him. She needed to hear from his own mouth what the truth was.

She only managed to hold back for a few minutes before she opened it again. A new PM. As expected.

“A bold ask from Golden Reign. If you want revenge, I won’t help you. You should know that by now. Why do you want to meet him?”

Rather than exploding with all of the reasons she had just thought of, she kept it concise. “I need to know.”

Luckily, that answer seemed to work as he almost immediately replied. “I’ll help you, but only if you are willing to meet me in person.”

In person? It seemed like he already knew exactly who she was, so this would only reveal his own identity. Why would he need to meet her? She didn’t want to risk arguing with him in case he changed his mind, though. There was no one else who could help her track down Shadow Phoenix. Well, besides Ashton, but it felt wrong in so many ways to ask him.

“Where do you want to meet?” she sent back. If it was somewhere she could easily go, she would do it. If not, she would have to give up.

MysteriousMaskz sent back an address just outside the city. It wasn’t too far, and it wasn’t a private residence either. She looked it up to see if it was in some kind of dodgy neighborhood, only to find the exact opposite. He had asked her to meet at a very exclusive club frequented by the rich and powerful. Unable to decide if this was more or less dangerous, she sent her reply.

“Will I be able to get in?”

“You are the only daughter of Aster Corp. You’ll get in just fine.”

There was only one more question to ask, in that case.

“When?”